Sunday, March 30, 2008

All of a Sudden I Miss Everyone

This one is called All of a Sudden I Miss Everyone and it borrowed its title, as you may or may not know, from the same album title of Texan band Explosions in the Sky. Other than reverence towards their music, it seemed fit at one point. At the time I was feeling morose, detached from all things. This usually happens when one of the two important things of my life are in jeopardy, love-life and work-life. It happened so they were both on the line then. And though I tried to separate the two as a subject for this painting, I still can't decide which one is more dominant. And how it all resulted with this image? As my life is largely influenced by the professional struggle of keeping up with exhibitions, shows, studio work practice and so on, I figured just how much I was oppressed by that same notion. The thought that dwelled in my mind then, and it dwells still, was the role of the institutions (mainly galleries and museums), housing the works, introducing the selected works into the art world. As I mentioned, this related to the issues of power, how it is used, by whom, and in whose favour. Further research led me to essey by Mieke Bal in which she thoroughly explores the role of the museum as it has been shaped in recent modern history. She takes the example of New York Met, as a house where almost everything that should be regarded as an important piece of art, can be found. Then she contrasted it to the Ethnographic museum. At that point I decided that the setting for the scene should be placed inside a natural history museum. All dead creatures, not a glance of life coming through, call me lame, but it seemed as a good message concerning the establishment all around. I also decided I should place myself within the scene because essentially the whole thing was about me in a way. Concerning my personal life, it is disreputable and a matter of bad taste to discuss these things in detail. What I can say is that for given work I positioned myself as someone being left behind by the loved one. It was important to me to generate an image of a notion so well known to most of us. That certain point when one has to lift himself up, above the damaged life, and find some strength to carry on. In order to get this idea through, I intended to place several figures, all having my form and image, and placed them in order to simulate dialogs between them (http://www.flickr.com/photos/zlatan-vehabovic/2265074073/, http://www.flickr.com/photos/zlatan-vehabovic/2265071533/ ). My suggestion was to amplify the fact of no one being around but yourself really. Eventually this idea fell off. I settled with one figure in the end, somehow feeling that alone is alone no matter how you look at it. Surrounding that initially came out of the previously mentioned discourse was now witnessing a completely different idea. Skeletons and the formaldehyde feel were messengers of bad news, reminding me of the constant duality embedded in this image.